The Beauty Within
by Eady of Old
Summary: John wakes to find a naked woman in his bed, and it isn't Anna. Oneshot crack-fic-ish.


**Summary: John wakes to find a naked woman in his bed, and it isn't Anna. Oneshot crack-fic-ish.**

**Disclaimer: I neither own Downton Abbey nor do I own these characters.**

**A/N: This story is written for terriejane's weekend challenge. The prompt (included at the end) was intended as more of a "crack fic" entry, but I believe my take on it ended up being more serious. But here it is anyway. Just a oneshot but drop me a review and let me know what you think.**

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><p>"Well, part of love is attraction," Anna pointed out coyly, her voice dropped low so no one walking past the boot room would hear her. "And attraction has mostly to do with a person's physical appearance."<p>

"I don't necessarily agree that is true," John said, smiling at her teasing tone. "Attraction is something that is part of the mind, not just the body. And I'd love you no matter how you look."

"You say that now. What about when I'm older and my hair's gone gray?"

"I'd love you with gray hair. I'd love you with no hair. And you love me even though I'm old," he pointed out.

"You aren't old," Anna chided him, "and even so, men of an age look distinguished."

"I am much older than you. While I'd never speculate on a number, Mrs. Hughes is definitely closer to my age than yours. Are you saying she doesn't look 'distinguished'? "

He smirked at her as she shook her head and swatted his arm. "I didn't say that. Don't be getting me in trouble, you."

"Even Mrs. Patmore is a fair woman, when she's all done up for church on Sundays," Bates stated.

Anna teased, "Should I worry about you with Mrs. Patmore, then?"

"You don't have to worry about me with anyone." His tone grew serious as his voice dropped lover. "You will always be the only one for me. Always, Anna."

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><p>He woke to the sound of snoring.<p>

While Bates had a tendency to snore when he lay too long on his back, rarely did he wake himself up with the racket. So he grew rather surprised as the noise continued even after he opened his eyes and blinked in the faint light of morning.

Surely that wasn't Anna snoring? She rarely made a peep at night unless she had a cold, and even then she only wheezed a bit in her sleep.

But no one else could be in their bedroom, in the bed with him by the sound of it, so it had to be her. John shifted, and as he did so, he remembered that he and Anna had fallen asleep together the night before, too tired after being intimate to change into their pajamas. He hated sleeping in the nude even though Anna showed no concern with it.

"What if there is a fire?" he'd said to her many times, and she would scold him for worrying. Of course, after the fire at the abbey, she had left him alone on the subject. But the night before had been... exhausting to say the least.

But Anna felt strange in Bates' arms - heavier, somehow. And she seemed more curvy than he remembered.

Suddenly, the snoring stopped and he heard Anna clear her throat, as though she had just woken up. Delighted that he would be able to tease her about being quite as loud as he'd ever been while asleep, John waited for her to come to consciousness.

"Mmm..." she vocalized, her voice strangely deep and hoarse. And as she stretched and rolled away from him, Bates' brow furrowed in confusion as he glimpsed her unfamiliar form.

"How did you sleep, darling?"

At first, the words did not register in his mind. John would have reeled backward if he hadn't been lying in bed as the voice registered at the same moment as he saw her face.

The woman in his bed was not his wife. Not Anna.

But he did recognize this woman, even with her hair down and her body bare.

"Mrs. Patmore?"

The name came out as an undignified gasp as he struggled to figure out where to look. Not at her, at the naked woman who was not his wife. But why was the cook there, in the cottage, in his bed? And why was she naked?

"John, what are you talking about?" she asked, sounding as calm and collected as he'd ever heard the woman. But his mind had trouble processing her words while his eyes kept focusing on... other distractions.

Once he was able to compose himself enough to speak, John stated severely, "Mrs. Patmore, I don't know what you're doing here, but this is most inappropriate. I'm a married man and I love my wife very much and... and..."

He blinked rapidly as he concentrated on keeping his eyes level with hers and not dropping them lower. While he did not intend to see the woman's body, it was difficult not to look. She showed no regard for her own nakedness and instead seemed more confused and hurt than embarrassed at her state of undress.

"Why do you keep calling me Mrs. Patmore?" she demanded. "And what exactly is inappropriate about us in the privacy of our own bedroom?"

Her comment reminded him of his own nudity and John quickly moved to cover himself. The woman beside him watched with bemusement as he did so before remarking, "It isn't like I haven't seen you before." But she paused to consider before following up with the query, "Is this some sort of game you're playing, pretending I'm someone else? I wouldn't have thought you'd be the type to fantasize over Mrs. Patmore, but if that's what you'd like..."

"No," he said, dropping the sheet he'd pulled up over his chest to hold out a hand. "No, no, not that at all."

The cook smiled at him and said, "Well, thank heavens. For a moment I was starting to worry you'd taken a fancy to someone else, as much as you keep going on like that."

"But-"

"Now we best get on before we're late up to the house. As it is, we'll have to hurry to make breakfast."

Without further discussion, she got out of the bed and strode over to the closet. John could not help but follow her with his eyes, too stunned to speak, as she began dressing in a black lady's maid's dress.

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><p>He walked with her up to the house, almost too stunned to speak as he tried to determine whether he was going mad. She spoke like Anna, used the same words and mannerisms. He'd never seen the woman smile so much. But she was definitely the face and body of Downton's cook.<p>

What was going on? John wondered if he'd inadvertently stepped into some sort of odd H.G. Wells novel. For her part, Mrs. Patmore - Anna - whatever she wanted to call herself, she thought _he _was the one behaving strangely.

"If you aren't well, you should stay home," she advised sweetly. "I'm sure Thomas can look after Lord Grantham today. It won't do you any good to get more sick being on your feet all day."

In truth, he wanted to see how everyone else would react to Mrs. Patmore's appearance. If it was all a prank on him, he supposed perhaps her appearing naked in his bed was taking it a bit too far. But as they entered the back door of the Abbey, no one else seemed to notice the oddness of him arriving with Downton's cook. "Good morning, Mrs. Bates. Mister Bates," Baxter greeted them.

"Good morning," she responded to the other lady's maid kindly, and John simply nodded dumbly.

He followed her into the servants' hall and took a seat next to her, too shocked at this turn of events to make small talk with anyone. Mrs. Patmore settled into her spot and began conversing with the others, asking Mrs. Hughes if Lady Mary had rung yet and getting up to speed on her duties.

John simply stared at each of them in turn, attempting to discern if their blindness was feigned or real. After careful scrutiny, he decided that they were all behaving normally. None of them saw anything amiss in the cook impersonating his wife.

"Daisy!"

The voice startled him, not the unusual boom he was used to but an oddly harsh Yorkshire lilt which was all too familiar. Automatically standing from his chair, John followed that voice into the kitchen.

And there she was, standing clear as day in one of Mrs. Patmore's dresses, tailered to her more slender form, barking out orders at the assistant cook as she stirred something in a mixing pot.

"Anna," he stated. But seeing her in the cook's costume did not assuage his growing unease as to his own mental health.

She looked back at him in clear annoyance. "What are you staring at?" she demanded crossly.

"Anna, what's going on?"

This time, she looked at him as though he'd suddenly sprouted a second head. "What are you going on about, Mister Bates?"

And Mrs. Patmore appeared suddenly at his side looking as concerned as she had earlier.

"He's been calling me by your name all day, Mrs. Patmore," the older woman said, frowning in concern at John.

Anna, or the woman who looked like Anna to him but apparently to everyone else was Downton's cook, said nothing for a moment. "Has he taken a blow to the head? Should you take him to the doctor?"

John looked between them, far too confused to make sense of matters. And his head did hurt, he realized. Finally, he stated, "Perhaps I will go back to the cottage and lie down for a while. I'm feeling very... fuzzy right now."

The two women watched him in concern as he slowly left the kitchen and headed for the back door.

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><p>His head was spinning and the ground seemed to move in the very opposite direction. The walk back to the cottage was slow going as John endeavored not to lose his equilibrium and fall. At one point, he stopped, worried the path was about to rise up and meet him, and in that moment he took time to reflect on the strange twist life had suddenly brought him.<p>

He was married to Mrs. Patmore. She believed herself to be his wife, Anna, lady's maid to Lady Grantham. And what's more, his beautiful Anna thought she was the cook.

The world truly had gone mad.

He made it back to the cottage eventually, his head pounding and his heart racing as though he'd just run twenty miles. Uncertain why he felt so strangely sick, he took a powder, changed, and crawled back into bed.

His dreams were full of Anna. Her voice, sweet like honey but also smooth and silky like fresh cream. Her hands, tiny and nimble as they swept across his tired old body, leaving him feeling young again like she had a healer's touch. Her gorgeous blue eyes, reminding him of poetry comparing them to portals into a person's soul. Every one of her features was as familiar to him as his own and twice as precious.

But beyond his love of her physical appearance, her face and body, he found himself dreaming about her mind, her good humor and amazing capacity for empathy. John remembered the hundreds of letters he kept in a trunk from his months in prison, her steady hand never failing to write him. The words on those pages were as precious an insight into his wife as the rose pedal softness of her skin. Her thoughts and fears and words of encouragement were his own personal gospel, as important to him as any worship he'd ever attempted.

Through the confused fog of his own fevered thoughts, John determined that without Anna's mind, her body meant nothing. Had he been given the untenable choice of loving his wife in the very different form of Mrs. Patmore, he would choose that change over having the cook in Anna's body. He needed Anna, no matter how she looked, no matter if she snored or was closer to his own age than the relative youth to which he'd grown accustomed.

And somewhere amid the dreams and worrying and growing sickness, John recalled that Anna likewise loved him despite his appearance. She had never known him as a young and fit man, the type who would have put even the athletic Thomas Barrow to shame in his earlier years. No, Anna only knew him after his injury in the Boers, after a lifetime of crushing disappointment had left him a broken man. And if she could see value in him despite such distractions, John knew he could live with Anna even if she had inexplicably reshaped herself into the body of Mrs. Patmore.

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><p>He woke to the sound of birds and the soft light of an overcast morning. Shifting in bed, John noted that his mouth felt dry and his entire body ached. He'd been sick the night before, he realized, taken with something like a burning fever that he'd scarcely anticipated. Had it been a fever? He could hardly tell and the discombobulation left him exhausted and befuddled. But he felt better at that moment - still weak, but with a clearer mind.<p>

Looking over, he saw Anna laying on the bed beside him, on top of the blanket and still in her work dress, curled up in a ball as though she'd been sitting and watching over him until she could no longer resist fatigue and had fallen asleep. He watched her for a time, studying her delicate features even as he found himself in love with her beauty all over again.

Many minutes passed before John remembered his dreams and wild imaginings from the day before. With a start, he recalled that his wife and Mrs. Patmore had inexplicably switched bodies.

"Anna?" he said aloud, suddenly alarmed that the woman beside him was not truly his wife.

His question brought her out of a shallow sleep and she straightened sharply, eyes blinking rapidly as her mind fought to shake off the bit of sleep she'd managed.

"How are you feeling?" she asked immediately, her tone soft but worried. "I've been so worried."

He sighed in relief as he recognized his wife in those two short sentences. "I'm much better now," he assured her.

"Do you remember what happened yesterday?" she asked.

"I remember coming back from the house after breakfast because I wasn't feeling well. Then I was here... I must have slept most of the day."

Anna shook her head. "You rolled out of bed yesterday morning. I think you were having a nightmare. You hit your head on the night stand as you fell, and I could not wake you at first. I had to go for the doctor, and he came to check on you. We've been keeping an eye on you ever since."

John's eyes narrowed. "So I never walked up to Downton yesterday?"

She shook her head.

"I didn't talk to you and Mrs. Patmore in the kitchen?" he asked.

"No, not at all," Anna answered. Neither one of us made it up there. I asked Doctor Clarkson to call Mr. Carson from the hospital to let him know what happened, and Mrs. Hughes stopped by last night to see how you were."

He stared at her blankly, feeling utterly confused. Had he imagined the entire day? Had the blow he'd taken to the head somehow transformed his memories of seeing his wife in the body of Mrs. Patmore?

Anna's forehead suddenly scrunched in confusion as she noted, "You did call out Mrs. Patmore's name quite a bit, when you were at your worst. It was as though you didn't recognize me."

He nodded, beginning to understand. "I must have had vivid waking visions," he noted. "I won't even begin to tell you what I saw and heard. It was so strange."

"Well, you sound better now," Anna told him. "The doctor said he would be back this morning. We thought about taking you in to the hospital but he decided you could stay here if I kept an eye on you. He should be by this morning."

Taking in her worried expression, the way her knit together to form a crease in her forehead when she fretted, John allowed himself a few seconds to appreciate her lovely face. Her eyes were darker in the muted daylight, probably further colored by strong emotion. But her skin was flushed giving her pale complexion a healthy glow as she sat up on the bed beside him.

"You are so beautiful," John remarked.

"And where is this coming from?" she asked, clearly amused by his sudden venture into romantic declarations.

"I just wanted you to know," he told her. "I don't say it enough, but you are a really beautiful person, Anna, both inside and out."

"Thank you," she stated, obviously pleased despite her embarrassment at the praise. Pressing her lips together for a moment, she observed after a moment, "Then I shouldn't worry about how much you were saying Mrs. Patmore's name yesterday? I was beginning to think I had some competition."

He snorted and assured her, "No competition at all."

John fell back asleep soon after that, but not before convincing his wife to change into her sleeping gown and join him under the covers.

_fin_

**Here was the prompt from terriejane: **

**Imagine a Freaky Friday sort of thing, only it's someone's dream/nightmare for sure, we just don't know who's.**

**A naked John Bates wakes up one morning (hey, he's John Bates so of course he's naked) with an equally naked Beryl Patmore draped over him. I know, right! He lets out a scream as he scoots off the bed. Only 'Mrs. P' thinks he's nuts and swears she's Anna. **


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